Scots pay a heavy penalty in defeat to Poland... but Clarke refuses to pin the blame on spot-kick sinner Hanley

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Steve Clarke last night refused to single out Grant Hanley after the defender conceded the stoppage-time penalty which continued Scotland’s woeful run of results.

Two goals down to Poland in the opening game of their Nations League group, the Scots dragged themselves back into the match with second-half strikes from Billy Gilmour and Scott McTominay.

Pushing for their first ever win over the Poles in a competitive fixture, Hanley hauled down Nicola Zalewski to gift the visitors their second penalty of the game in the sixth minute of added time.

Zalewski picked himself up to convert from 12 yards and extend the run of Clarke’s side to one win in 13 games; their only victory coming in a friendly against Gibraltar.

In the midst of their longest winless run at home since 2008, the Scotland boss felt his team deserved a point at least, but refused to level any blame on Hanley.

Hanley reflects on his late foul which drained the life out of a previously buoyant Hampden

Scots fans feared the worst when Hanley was left one-on-one with Zalewski... and so it proved

Zalewski's measured effort from 12 yards was just too firm and well-placed for Gunn to get to

‘We’re obviously disappointed to lose a game like that, a game that we shouldn’t lose,’ said Clarke. ‘If you make errors at this level you get punished and we got punished severely for the errors that we made in the game.

‘Everyone’s disappointed. We lost a game that we shouldn’t have lost. It’s not about picking out individuals, we never do that, I’ve never done that. I’m not going to start now

‘We win as a team, we lose as a team. We’ll go away, we’ll analyse the game and we’ll speak in camp.

‘I think if I analyse the performance I have to be happy with the performance. There’s a small crumb of comfort for a head coach.

‘We didn’t have a lot of time to work on the training pitch. We knew the system that Poland would play would cause one or two different issues to what you would normally face.

‘I thought we dealt with that well, the team shape was good, the attitude and energy of the players was excellent. The other thing is if you make small mistakes at this level you get punished.’

Trailing 2-1 and chasing a leveller, Clarke pitched in the trio of Ben Doak, Ryan Gauld and Lawrence Shankland in the 70th minute.

Clarke praises Gilmour as the midfielder is subbed late on, but there were few grins at time-up

Lifting the crowd, Middlesbrough teenager Doak played a part in the McTominay strike which should have snatched a Nations League point.

‘I think they brought energy to the game at a time when the game had opened up. All the substitutions that went on to the pitch made a good impact on the game.

‘Obviously it helps when you make a substitution and you score immediately, that helps everybody.

‘It gets us back to a scoreline which should have been the worst scoreline we faced at the end of the game. It should have been at worst 2-2. Like I said, you get punished for mistakes at this level.’

After losing a poor goal to Sebastian Szymanski after eight minutes, right-back Anthony Ralston’s lunging challenge conceded the first penalty of the night before half-time, leaving the Scots with a second half mountain to climb.

Ralston's clumsy challenge on Zalewski drew the first spot-kick of a disappointing evening

After shipping 17 goals in their last eight games, Clarke identified hard work on the training ground as the key to turning things around.

Portugal beat Croatia 2-1 in the other group game and the Scots now travel to Lisbon hoping to stop the rot against Cristiano Ronaldo and co.

‘It certainly doesn’t get any tougher than going to Lisbon to play Portugal,’ added Clarke. ‘At the moment I just feel really disappointed for the players because I thought their efforts deserved to get at least a point out of the game.’